


phonation & other difficulties

by sulfuric



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: 5+1 Things, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Pennywise (IT), Fluff, M/M, Pining, richie being massively in love but not saying anything about it for many many years. as one does
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-07-26
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:42:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25517476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sulfuric/pseuds/sulfuric
Summary: richie feels a surge ofsomething,then, big and dizzy all the way through his fingertips. he’s wondering if eddie can feel it buzzing on his skin, too, when the wordsi love youslide onto his tongue, unasked for, sitting there and waiting for richie to do something about it.(or, five times richie wanted to tell eddie he loved him, and the one time eddie beat him to it.)
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 21
Kudos: 165





	phonation & other difficulties

**Author's Note:**

> no caps bc this is my fic and i make the rules. i realized i’ve never written a 5 + 1 before and i MUST pay my dues to the gay community. hope yall like it!!!!

_1_

it’s second grade, and richie is picking at the new bandaid on his elbow.

it’s from his friend, eddie. his _best_ friend, according to the rules he’d overheard mackenzie harrison listing off during lunchtime. before he’d met eddie, he’d never heard of a kid who carried around bandaids with him, much less cleaning spray and gauze. but he’s been friends (best friends) with eddie for about a year now, ever since the first day of first grade, and he knew eddie would be able to help him out when he tripped over his shoelaces and scraped his elbow on the way down.

it’s not the first time he’s gotten hurt at recess. sometimes, he just gets excited and his feet don’t always go right. he’s at the point where he’s not afraid of the pavement anymore. he’s not afraid of much, actually, not like eddie or stan, but he is still kind of afraid of teachers. one time, eddie was home sick. so, he went up to mrs. doyle after he scraped his knee at first recess because she was the teacher on duty and she had one of those funny pouches like eddie did, so he thought she might have bandaids. but then she’d sent him inside, like back to class, instead of just giving him a bandaid and letting him play. she’d even yelled at him when he asked why he had to have his recess taken away if he didn’t break any rules.

teachers yell at him a lot. he doesn’t like it. he likes eddie, and he likes when eddie sits with him on the ground after he gets hurt, even though that’s where the bugs are. right now his elbow is all patched up, still stinging from the smelly spray eddie puts on all his scrapes, and he’s watching eddie’s tongue poking out of his mouth as he ties richie’s shoes. he’s pretty sure he doesn’t know he’s doing it, because usually he’ll tell bill he’s going to catch flies when he leaves his mouth open for too long. but his tongue is out there, a rare sight—rare: something you don’t see a lot; one of the vocabulary words richie got marked _perfect_ on this week’s quiz—and he’s saying the rhyme quietly to himself, so quietly richie thinks eddie doesn’t want anyone to hear him saying it. but richie knows it well, hears it every single morning when his mom walks him through the steps of tying his shoes, _like a second grader._ which he is, now!

but maybe eddie is a bit more of a second grader than richie is, because he’s really good at the whole thing, rhyme or not. it’s not the first time he’s held richie’s feet down, making gagging sounds at the feeling of richie wiggling his toes from inside his shoes. still, he ties them every time. 

“you need to be more careful, richie,” he says when he’s finished, sitting back on his heels with an exhausted sigh, a hard day’s work done. richie catches stan smirking from off to the side, then bill too, a second or two later.

“i know,” richie replies, smacking his feet on the ground like it’s a bicycle, just a few times to see how they feel. he knows it’s bad to swear, but he _swears_ eddie does this better than his mom. they’re tight, like a hug, or like maybe he could be a witch and have water thrown all over him and everything but his feet would melt, only eddie’s bunny ears holding him up. he gasps a bit then and stops his stomping, sitting up straight and clearing his throat. “thank you, eddie.” 

richie knows his manners, he does, he just forgets sometimes. but he never forgets with eddie, because eddie is his best friend. that’s just how best friends work, at least according to mackenzie. he’s not sure if it’s manners or best friends when he wants to keep going after _thank you._ he thinks there’s something else he should tell eddie—after all, tying his shoes was usually a mom job, and family isn’t like best friends. when mom ties his shoes he says _i love you,_ but he also says that to her when she gets him from school and when he goes to bed, so he thinks that even if he wants to, maybe he shouldn’t say it to eddie.

he’s still thinking about it when the recess bell rings, so instead he just stands up and gives eddie a hug, wondering if his arms can squeeze as tight as his shoes do. 

* * *

_2_

it’s seventh grade, and richie is looking at the first broken bone he’s ever seen.

he’s seen them on tv before, but that’s nothing compared to looking at his best friend’s arm bent all wrong and flopping all over the place as eddie wheezes. they’re here because bill wanted to explore that creepy old house on neibolt. there were ghost stories, ones that him and mike and ben insisted were true whenever they told them in the dark of richie’s basement at sleepovers. 

and maybe it was ghosts, angry that seven preteens were traipsing around their house, or maybe it was just because the house was old and shitty and the floor gave way under eddie’s feet as he turned to tell richie something. whatever he was trying to communicate was lost to the dead air of the second floor as eddie was suddenly lying in a cloud of dust down by the front door, hallway groaning terribly as richie leaned over to watch it happen.

now, he’s on his knees at eddie’s side, watching him scream but not really hearing it as the rest of their friends rush over with cries of _eddie_ and _holy shit._ there’s so much going on that richie nearly sees it in snapshots: bill’s hand on eddie’s shin; mike fumbling with the zipper on eddie’s fanny pack, shoving the inhaler into his mouth; ben standing stock-still on the other side of the room; bev getting one good glimpse and walking out the front door; stan following her and speaking an urgent “mom, mom, we need help,” into his cell phone—the only one between the seven of them lucky enough to be given one.

and then there’s eddie, eyes wider than richie’s ever seen and ricocheting back and forth between his own arm and richie’s face, which probably looks just as panicked. for once the voice in his head is quiet, perhaps drowned out by everything else in this house of horrors, so he puts one hand on eddie’s shoulder and the other on his thigh, holding him down in place. he has no idea if it’s actually helping, but then eddie gives a thin and broken _richie_ and he supposes that’s something. 

“i’m here, it’s okay, we’re gonna get you some help,” he says, and eddie is nodding frantically as if he really believes it.

“sssssssss—f-fuck, stuh-stuh-stan is, he’s c-uh. he’s calling h-his mmmmom, sh-sh-sh-sh-sh— _fuck!”_

richie takes his hand off eddie’s thigh and moves it on top of bill’s, squeezing tight. bill lets out a choked sob in response, and richie gives him a tiny, hopefully reassuring smile before turning back to eddie. “andrea will take you to the hospital, eds. we’ve got you. i promise.”

eddie swallows, blinking weakly over at mike and bill with his jaw clenched tight. “thanks, richie,” he says weakly, eyes back on him with a new kind of determination, the stutter of his chest slowly just slightly. richie feels a surge of _something,_ then, big and dizzy all the way through his fingertips. he’s wondering if eddie can feel it buzzing on his skin, too, when the words _i love you_ slide onto his tongue, unasked for, sitting there and waiting for richie to do something about it. 

his mouth feels swollen and heavy as he recoils, just a bit, at the shock of them being there. eddie quirks an eyebrow at him, confusion peeking through the pain as richie obviously goes through the rise and fall of realizing that no matter how foreign this thought feels—like it was plucked from someone else and placed inside neatly inside of him to be found at a later date—it’s undeniable that it feels _right,_ too, something as plain and obvious as it would be if he’d thought _stan is jewish_ or _bev’s hair is red_ or _eddie’s arm is broken._

something so plain and obvious that you’d have to be crazy not to believe it.

and for a second he thinks it wouldn’t be crazy to say it, either, something to comfort eddie while he’s lying there in the debris of the upstairs hallway with his arm dangling the wrong way. his tongue is halfway to pressing against the back of his teeth, the words in motion, when that voice comes back full force, either himself or the ghosts living here or something else telling him that he’s a _fucking homo_ if he says shit like that.

so he clenches his teeth together and thinks about how his dad wants to start him on braces next month, and watches the look on eddie’s face fade in favour of something mike is saying to him, comforting words about the new baby sheep on his farm.

eddie loves the sheep, and he only likes richie. this will be much more of a comfort, and richie knows that as he presses his tongue to the roof of his mouth, hard. 

* * *

_3_

it’s the summer before ninth grade, and richie is standing in front of a bridge. 

he’s stood in front of this bridge plenty of times, but only once alone. this isn’t that time—that time was last summer, kneeling in the dirt like a prayer with his hands clasped around a penknife as if it were a rosary, carving out his own heart like a scripture or a penance, depending which way you look at it. this time is like any other time, flanked by six of his friends like some sort of sitcom posse member. he’s not sure how he got this lucky, having these people in his life. at this point it’s pretty certain they’re here to stay, especially with them all going to the same high school come fall. 

he loves them, he does, with everything in him. just not right now.  
they were heading to the quarry, with a pit stop in the barrens so they could find some wildflowers bev could use to make them all flower crowns like her cousin in portland showed her how to do last weekend. this means they had to pass by the kissing bridge, which under normal circumstances would be _fine._ however, this time, stan decides that he thinks he hears a spotted redshank, whatever the fuck that is. and whatever the fuck that is, it’s reason enough for the entire group to park their bikes and hang out by the bridge while he wades into the brush practically pissing his khakis with excitement.

richie always thought stan was kidding when he said he did boy scouts. he thought they stopped running that shit in the 80’s, but evidently it was still here to ruin his life in the modern world. lucky him!

richie is purposefully standing in the middle of the road, facing that one unmentionable side of the bridge so that eddie is forced to look at him, away from all the carvings, as they’re talking. but richie’s not really paying attention to whatever eddie’s saying (the new ice cream flavour he wants to try at superfreeze or something? it’s enthusiastic, nonetheless) because he’s looking at bev, who is sitting cross legged with her back up against the wooden fence, shoulder touching the leftmost leg of the _R_ he’d put there nearly a year ago.

and the thing is this: richie had been pretty pleased to find out that he wasn’t one of those kids that got suddenly really sweaty all the time when he got hit by puberty (acne, voice cracks, and aching limbs all another story, tragically) but right now? he’s feeling pretty fucking sweaty. 

“are you even listening to me?” eddie says then, eyes narrowed all annoyed. richie blinks, waiting for his brain to catch up with the sounds coming out of eddie’s mouth as he huffs an inpatient sigh.

“spaghetti, you know i’m never not hanging on your every last word. you got things to say, and i got ears to listen. you must forgive me if they’re not what they used to be,” he says, smoothly morphing into his old man character, painful twinge going through his spine as he hunches over. 

eddie giggles, slapping a hand over his mouth as his eyebrows fight to go back to their default annoyed state. “god, you’re bad at that. you said you wanted to audition for the school play next year? good luck,” he says sarcastically, putting his hands on his hips.

“only if you get to play my leading lady!” he quips back, taking much delight in the way eddie’s face distorts with the scandal of it all, lips pouting sourly. 

_i could kiss him right now, easy,_ richie thinks, unwelcome but not entirely unexpected at this point. he’s gotten good at not letting it show when stuff like this pops into his head because boy, is that _often._ somewhere between getting called a _fag_ at the arcade and popping a boner waking up with eddie’s face pressed into the crook of his neck at a sleepover last summer, richie had more or less come to terms with the fact that he had feelings, and that he had them for eddie. hence, the carving he’s trying not to stare at over eddie’s shoulder, _R + E_ there and immortal for anyone that dared to let their eyes wander. so what. as long as none of his friends see it, and as long as he doesn’t have a stroke and actually lean in and kiss eddie right now, it’s fine. no one has to know bowers was right all along.

but what if they did know? what if eddie knew? what if richie grabbed him by the shoulders and turned him around—or no, maybe, if eddie let him, by the hand—and took him over to bev and said “hey guys, look, it’s like richie and eddie! we have to fall in love now, eds, that’s the kissing bridge law. or else a ghost will come give you herpes.” 

he’d like to do it, he thinks. maybe not like that, but he’d like to do it, period. if anything, he thinks eddie deserves to hear it. it would be so easy. he thinks the rest of it would be too, bowers and small town be damned. people are gay. it happens. maybe it could happen to them, bev looking over her shoulder and calling out to them like “hey guys, check this out.” maybe richie would confess and his friends wouldn’t hate him and everything would be okay and then—

“okay, i think it’s gone. we can go to the barrens now,” stan says, emerging from the bushes like some whimsical woodsman here to ruin all of richie’s gay fantasies. 

“ugh, finally,” eddie says, turning away and walking over to bev where she’s reaching up at him with grabby hands. richie stands there and watches the both of them groan—comically, over-the-top, jointly gunning for richie’s position as group funnyman—as eddie helps her up, his head turned down right toward, left to right: bev, and richie’s heart.

they grab their bikes and go, only passing by the bridge again when the sun has dipped low over the horizon. after that, when they’re grabbing blankets from richie’s room to haul down into the basement, eddie’s eyes stop over the penknife laying on richie’s desk. 

“what the hell, your parents let you have that?” 

richie blinks. technically, they let him use it once for a school project then just forgot to ask for it back when he was done. eddie’s not looking, but he shrugs anyway. “sure.”

“cool.” his fingers are flexing over their hold on richie’s pillow, as if he wants to reach out and flip it open, see how it feels in his hands. _it’s heavy, eds. real heavy,_ richie thinks, and he’s just about to ask him if he wants to give it a try when eddie looks at him suddenly, eyes so bright it nearly knocks the breath out of him.

“ready to go?”

_no, actually i have a story about that knife, if you wanna hear it._

_in a sec? i kind of wanted to talk to you about something._

_woah, trying to sell me short on the quality time this week?_

_no, i’d rather stay here and make out, if that’s cool with you._

_remember how i was kinda spacey by the bridge today?_

“‘course! if we stay up here any longer, they’ll think i skipped out to go bang your mom.”

eddie smacks him across the face with the pillow. “beep beep, richie!

that night, while the credits roll on _jurassic park,_ richie decides he’ll say it, some day. not today, but some day.

* * *

_4_

it’s senior year of high school, and richie is convincing himself he’s not afraid of public transit. 

this is his issue: the subway is basically just a glorified metal tube, and it’s _underground,_ so if you get stuck you’re basically fucked. then even if you do get out, it might be the wrong stop, because there’s a million of them, and then you get lost in the city and never see anyone you love ever again. and okay, maybe myra’s lecturing on subway pole germs (and their subsequent trickling down into eddie, bits and pieces sticking in his psyche among the strides he’s taken to leave that vein of thinking behind, despite it all richie is proud, so fucking _proud)_ has gotten to him a bit. sue him.

richie likes driving. on his sixteenth birthday, his dad handed him the keys to the old family station wagon, and that was _it._ richie was ready to start the engine and gun it west and keep going until he hit the ocean. see, that’s the thing about LA—it’s all cars, so richie would feel at home right away if he went there for college.

but then eddie brings up new york city, and richie’s heart is yanked back east so abruptly he thinks he might have acquired a murmur. he doesn’t know if it’s possible just to like, get one of those, but he knows that there’s _something_ up in there when he sees eddie’s eyes light up with _nyu_ and _bodegas_ and _getting a loft together._ together, the losers, together. at first richie thinks he means together, richieandeddie, and his brain doesn’t know what to do with that information so he just sits there patiently and waits to be able to hear what eddie’s saying again, now about how there’s a really good creative writing program that bill would be _all over._

and it’s not even a question when eddie asks him, “do you think you’ll apply?” because deep down, richie knows that he was ready to follow eddie wherever the hell he went after derry _long_ before college applications were on his radar. and maybe that’s not entirely good, to do that for someone, but he’s doing it for six someones, actually, so mind your own business maybe? 

“of course,” he says, heart murmuring or beating or screaming or whatever the fuck it’s been doing these days when eddie smiles, turning his laptop screen so that richie can see it open on nyu’s _program directory_ page. richie scrolls, eyes catching on a few different options, but all he can really think about is how _proud_ he is, sitting here with an eddie that’s advocating for himself, fighting for his own future and making it happen—and making it happen with the losers in it. he feels so happy in this one moment that he could burst, feels it leaking out of him and asking how the fuck he got so lucky to have eddie in his life, to be in _eddie’s_ life, a part of it that was, clearly, wanted and valued and treasured beyond the confines of derry, circumstance and proximity be damned.

and okay, maybe not wanted in the same way richie wants _him,_ but wanted. richie’s not so sure new york is going to feel like home, at least not right away—everything loud and fast and bright; maybe what he wants in a t-shirt, or a friend (best friend), or a lover, theoretically, but he’s skeptical if he wants it in a city, always leaning to the mellow ebb and flow of the quarry at sunrise, or even the drag of the waves on the shore of a beach, when his family got to go—but he knows that wherever the losers are, he’ll have a home. wherever _eddie_ is, he’ll have a home.

so what if that’s new york? what is it they say, sinatra’s law or whatever—if richie can make eddie love him there, then maybe eddie can love him anywhere. maybe eddie can _love him,_ period. 

(richie’s not stupid. eddie’s gay, they found that out last year. he knows the way eddie looks at him isn’t quite the way he looks at bill or stan or mike or ben. he just doesn’t know if it’s _that_ way, specifically, the way richie’s looked at him for his entire life.)

richie submits the application to the portal that afternoon, eddie cheering him on and texting the group chat the whole time. 

“i’m so excited,” eddie says, smile almost disbelieving. richie wants to say it then, to take the words and place them in eddie’s hands, watch as they soak in. _i love you. this is for you. everything i do is for you. i want to be sitting beside you for the rest of my life. i never want you to stop looking at me like that. i love you. i love you, i love you, i love you._

instead, he gives eddie’s shoulder a shove, says, “me too,” and hopes he knows what he means. 

* * *

_5_

it’s freshman year of college, and richie is standing in the pouring rain.

he has a half-formed plan and a pair of vans that are completely soaked through. he’s doing great, clearly. the events that have led him here are most unfortunate, and he thinks that if this goes well he might take on taking down tinder, next. 

but he doesn’t get farther than that thought because then he’s standing in front of eddie’s dorm with his half-formed plan and his ruined shoes and, now joining the party, both best friend turned crush turned definitely unrequited crush, and said unrequited crush with a tower of proof no less than six feet, four inches tall.

this is where we’re at, currently—eddie’s going on a date, with a guy from tinder. richie’s running across campus and skidding to a slippery stop in front of them, plan going soggy and slipping between his fingers, landing splat on the pavement in front of him.

at least he has his shoes. 

see, the plan, before it came worm food at least, was for him to march over here all romantic like and declare his undying love, then eddie would ditch the giant man before he even showed up and richie would be the one to take him on a date instead.

alas, richie tozier has missed the boat on that one, folks!

“richie? what are you doing here?” eddie’s underneath this man’s umbrella, so high over his head it just looks silly. his face looks a little silly too, eyes wide in confusion, more so than is probably necessary for running into your best friend on campus. richie tries not to notice anything else, but eddie is dressed up. he’s dressed up, honest to god dressed up, top button done and hair gelled and everything. and of course, it’s all protected by the stupid umbrella. richie wants to cry.

“oh, you know, just goin’ for a walk,” he says instead, gesturing vaguely to the sidewalk behind him. he rocks back and forth on his heels as eddie takes that in, takes _him_ in, dripping from head to toe and breathing heavy. it’s in this time that richie allows himself to let his eyes wander—casually, coolly, in a way that’s normal and average and fine—over to the date man himself, blinking in all 6’4 of him. he’s gorgeous, and not at all what richie would have expected to be eddie’s type. richie turns to eddie with a look a normal person would give and asks, “this the guy?”

eddie flushes red, clenching his jaw for just a second before the guy laughs, all sing-songsy and beautiful and whatever. “hey, sorry jake, this is my idiot friend, richie,” eddie says, gesturing bluntly to the wet rat in front of him. richie catches sight of an actual wet rat scurrying around a storm drain over by jake’s feet, and thinks of the various appendages he’d give to switch places with it right now. any of his fingers, for sure. 

jake is clearly unaware these ruminations, because he shows off some very nice teeth _(at least one of those is a crown,_ richie thinks bitterly) and says, “hey richie, it’s nice to meet you.”

the rat twitches in place. (the other rat, the one richie has named steve, mocks him from the ground with a shiver.) “that’s richard to you, hot stuff.” he watches eddie titter out of the corner of his eye and then blinks up (up! the audacity) at jake and flashes a smile of his own. _you’re not the only one with access to good dentistry, prick._ “charmed. make sure he gets back in one piece, yeah?”

richie doesn’t wait for a reply to turn on a heel and head back down the street, steve scuttling out of his way while eddie mutters a rushed apology, already out of earshot by the time richie has shoved his hands into his pockets, shaking.

he starts to wonder if maybe, he already missed his shot. 

* * *

_+1_

it’s still freshman year of college, and richie has reached his breaking point. 

jake turned out to be graduating that year and planning to move to idaho for god knows what reason, so that whole thing ended up being a bust. eddie wasn’t too broken up about it. richie was elated.

they’re sitting together on the bed of richie’s dorm room. eddie came under the pretense of studying for the last midterm for their one shared class, anthropology, and while that definitely did sort of happen, they’ve long since devolved into just talking about whatever. for the last fifteen minutes or so it’s been the latest update of people’s summer plans—who managed to find a job in the city and who was planning on going home, what apartments had been secured or lost or if anyone had committed to staying in student housing, yet.

y’know, adult stuff. it scares richie more than he’d like to admit, and in turn he’d kind of put all that on the back burner, shutting down whenever stan asked him to come to apartment showings with him and ben. he’s lucky as shit that he has friends willing to sort of just take care of it for him—the plan was for the seven of them to split two apartments, and richie would be happy with whatever configuration he ended up in.

okay, maybe he has _some_ preferences. 

“rich?” eddie’s looking at him expectantly, clearly having just asked a question when richie’s brain was off hanging out elsewhere.

“hm?”

“i asked you if you think it’s gonna change things when we all live together.” his forehead has those little wrinkles in them, like he’s worried or he’s focusing on something real hard. eddie’s been a little more short-fused this past week or two, and richie realizes then that this is probably why. 

“no way,” he says, putting on his best reassuring face, “lucky seven, remember? whatever happens, we’re better together.” 

eddie smiles at that, genuine, but still looks a little unsure. he pulls his legs up to chest and lets his gaze drop, worried. “yeah, i know. i just—i don’t know. how can you be so sure? i feel like i’m going to mess everything up.” he looks up at richie at this, pointed and through his eyelashes like some goddamn disney character. richie thinks he might die, so much that it takes a minute for the actual words to register.

“mess it up?” he repeats, volume definitely way too loud for this conversation. eddie flinches back just slightly, and richie shakes his head, continuing on. “spaghetti, you could _never_ mess _any_ of it up. you hear me?” richie knows for sure that eddie’s seriously freaked about this when he doesn’t even react to the nickname, giving a small and unconvinced nod instead when richie waits for it. “i lo—the losers all love you, and there’s nothing you could do that would make any of us not want to live with you. even murder, dude. as long as it’s not one of us, you know any of the losers would be there to help you get rid of the body.”

eddie laughs, shaky. “i’m not gonna kill anybody, oh my god.”

“i know that, but i’m saying if you _wanted_ to, we’d be right there with you. and hey, i’m pretty sure it was your idea to come to new york in the first place—we followed you here, right?” _i followed you here. i’d follow you anywhere._ it comes to him unexpected, uncalled for, and with it a surge of emotion so strong that richie barely registers eddie’s quiet _right._ he feels it all building very suddenly, the air between them electric and urging richie on. _how about now?_ it asks. _how about you shut up and let me do this,_ richie replies.

he clears his throat and tries to look at eddie instead of the comforter. inhales. _you can be brave like him._ exhales.

“you know, i—i wasn’t all that sold on new york when you first brought it up but then the group was so excited about it and when we all came here it sort of immediately just felt like? right? that we were all here together? and on one of those first nights i got… okay i got sort of lost because i got off on the wrong subway stop because all the numbers are the fucking same, man, and i thought i would feel really scared out there alone in the dark, because i basically spent all of last summer convincing myself i would get lost and none of you would find me and i’d die. but anyway, i got lost and i didn’t? feel like that? i just started walking and it felt like home—even though i’d never been to that part of the city before—as if just knowing that i was here and this city was _ours_ was like, enough to know i’d find my way back home. but now also i’m thinking it was because it already felt like home? on that random street? and eds, i—it felt like home because it was a like, classic new york city street, and i’d spent so much time listening to you tell me about new york that i guess it just kind of all sat in the same spot in my brain that you do, so when i got there i already loved it because it felt like you. which i guess is a really long way to say that i think i think—well, no, i _know_ i think of you as home and i just want you to—” 

“richie, i’m in love with you.”

“listen, i’m kind of building up to something here, can you just—wait _what?”_

“i’m in love with you.” it’s almost aggressive, like a challenge, eddie’s eyes just a bit wider than usual, balancing precariously on the edge of something deranged, halfway between some inner battle richie can’t hope to identify and something that feels like, maybe, hopefully, a reaction to his whole thing.

there was a lot that richie was planning to say here—the home metaphor was really coming together there and he was almost at the big finish, but all of those thoughts have most definitely nosedived out the window with the rest of richie’s brain, to the tune of one, _richie, i’m in love with you_ echoing in the empty space of his skull.

he had things to say. he _has_ things to say, but what comes out instead is simply a soft, keening kind of, “really?”

and then eddie’s lip starts to tremble, but he doesn’t break richie’s stare. “yeah,” he says, crossing his arms. richie gets this insane urge to pull them apart, let his hands slide down over the skin until their fingers lock, but instead he just sits there and watches eddie huff and roll his eyes, finally, lips pressing hard together while he furrows his brow at richie— 

—richie: fluttering, floating, heart squeezing out of the spaces between his ribs like play-doh in a hydraulic press. 

“well are you gonna fucking say something about it?” it’s pleading, and the rawness of it is tapering off into something guarded and _sad,_ really fucking sad, so riche gives him something between a nod and a shake and eddie clenches his jaw one more time while richie is thinking. richie is thinking. he is thinking of this time and all the other times he wanted to tell him which is really just every single time he’s ever been in eddie’s presence—stretching dead set ahead and behind him in perfect symmetry—like his entire life is just proof, proof of love and light and that these are the only things that have ever mattered. proof that he’s in love with eddie: fully, inherently, simply. he has the thoughts but he doesn’t have the words, at least not anymore. and it’s maybe the world’s greatest joke, funnier than any of his, because he never stops talking but he doesn’t know now how to say the one thing he really believes, to the one person that _makes_ him believe, who’s sitting in front of him with love staining his lips like all those popsicles richie felt wrong for sharing. who’s standing in front of him, tears in his eyes, waiting for—

oh.

waiting for richie to tell him if he loves him, too. too, because eddie loves richie. _too._

“christ, nevermind,” eddie mutters then, so low richie can barely hear it as he turns away, legs fumbling off the side of the bed. then richie’s hand is shooting out and grabbing eddie’s wrist, the two of them frozen in place with a burning sun in the middle of them—skin surely burning away to nothing, but when richie dares to look down, they’re somehow intact. and it looks so much like he imagined it, so shockingly familiar that he can only gasp, the sound doing nothing to help the terrified look on eddie’s face.

“are you having a fucking stroke?” eddie manages to squeak out, the first tear finally falling as richie’s eyes shoot up to his, deer in the headlights. oh, how he’d like to call eddie _dear._

“i—” he starts, if you can be so generous to call it that. eddie’s brows drop down low as richie gesticulates vaguely with his other hand, wooden and inarticulate, and then tilts his chin forward angrily in response. but, richie notes, numbly, he makes no move to remove his arm from the sweaty grasp of richie’s fingers.

“rich.” and this is where he cracks open, voice tearing apart small and sad as he begins to cry in earnest, now. richie feels a rush of panic go through him—pretty sure he honest to god twitches or something, just a bit—at the thought that he’s the one making eddie feel like this, making him _hurt_ like this, when all he wants to do is tell him he’s been in love with him since before he knew how to tie his own shoes. 

(which, given, was actually pretty late compared to most other kids. it’s not richie’s fault that 1. he wasn’t the most dextrous kid, or 2. eddie always offered to tie them for him; was he just supposed to say no and _not_ sit there and watch the way his eight year-old brow furrowed down at richie’s sneakers? also—)

“are you fucking laughing right now?” eddie spits, ripping his arm away from richie’s hold and cradling it to his chest. richie thinks he might feel the vague sensation of a hysterical, half-baked smile on his own lips, love drunk enough to have his vocal cords held in place by the pure delirium of it all.

eddie, on the other hand. “i swear to fucking _god,_ richie, the least you could do is have some tact! or some fucking, i don’t know, consideration? i mean i’m here telling you i _love_ you and you’re just—you just—”

richie sees no other way to end this conversation than to grab eddie’s face and kiss him on the mouth, so that’s exactly what he does, right in the middle of the hiccupping and the hand waving and the rest of it, melting into each other as if that’s where they were really supposed to be all along. 

when he pulls away they’re both breathless, eddie’s eyes nearly bulging out of his head as richie’s feels himself near disintegrate, tears welling up in his eyes as eddie’s face finally softens again, hands fumbling their way to the back of richie’s neck, threading into his hair and pulling him closer for another kiss. 

richie could not tell you how long they stay like that, mouths moving urgently against each other, before he’s able to suck in a huge breath, both of them breathing hard with foreheads pressed together. he’s really not sure why he spent all these years _talking_ when he could have been _kissing,_ but his plans to resolve that gross imbalance are thwarted when eddie peels away, placing a firm hand on richie’s chest.

“richie, richie, wait, you have to say _words.”_

“i’m—” richie’s eyes widen as his throat dries up, eddie biting back an exasperated, frantic smile as they just look at each other for a few more seconds, the world’s weirdest and most emotionally charged staring contest ever held. eddie grabs one of richie’s hands off his face and laces their fingers together, exhaling sharply through his nose as richie short-circuits again, mouth sputtering around a dozen separate failed attempts at speech.

“that was—that was pretty fucking cool, and i’d love to do it again sometime, but richie, you have to say something,” eddie says sweetly, voice balancing precariously on the edge of a giggle. he blinks, eyes going sympathetic when richie stays silent. “it’s alright, i know you have trouble when—” richie nods vigorously, somewhere between _yeah you’ve got it_ and _he knows me of course he knows me he loves me he loves me even though he knows me._ eddie exhales, raising his eyebrows as if to say _okay, well?_ and richie just continues to sit there, most emphatically silent. you’d think he’d have figured out the right way to say it by now; he’s only been pining for a decade. all talk and _no talk,_ apparently. jesus, is this how bill feels?

“okay trashmouth, i’m normally begging for you to shut up, so you’re really squandering a rare opportunity, here,” he tries, taking his free hand and bringing it up to rest on richie’s, still cupping his jaw. “c’mon, let me have it.” 

and apparently that’s the password or some shit, because richie smiles and opens his mouth. “like i let your mom have it last—”

_“richie!”_

“ah! i’m sorry! my brain doesn’t _work!”_ he whisper-screams, resting his forehead against eddie’s again with a thud. he just needs to start talking, the _right_ way to say it be damned. “i just—i don’t like tying my own shoes! they’re never tight enough! it makes me feel safe when you do them so i leave them untied and hope i run into you on campus just so you can tell me i’m gonna trip over them and break my nose. and if that happens, then fine, because you’d spend an hour telling me it’s not gonna heal right and i’d get to sit there while you look at it. and i could look at you, which, jesus fucking christ, eds, before like five seconds ago when i didn’t know what it was like to kiss you? looking at you is the only thing i ever wanna do. i mean i’m definitely expanding my catalogue now to include kissing you, and holding your hand, and holding your face while your hand holds my hand, whatever that’s called—my range, honestly—and i, oh, fuck. i forget what i was gonna say next.”

“richie—”

“oh! okay yeah. uh, wait, _shit._ god, i need to get my meds refilled. can you remind me to do that tomorrow?”

there’s a beat where the question hangs in the air between them and richie thinks maybe he’s ruined it, but then eddie speaks softly, almost shy. “i had it written in my planner to tell you to do that tonight. your pharmacy closes at seven, so.”

richie gasps quietly. “no _way.”_

“i can show you,” he says, shrugging nonchalantly. “it’s in my bag.”

richie leans in and presses another kiss to his lips, quick and chaste, then smiles. “wait,” he says, thumb reaching up to wipe away the last of the wetness gathered underneath eddie’s eyelashes, “first. i’m in love with you, too. if that, uh, if that wasn’t obvious. i think the fact that i haven’t straight up told you that every single time i’ve ever looked at you in the past twelve years is honestly my greatest accomplishment.” eddie’s face melts a bit at that, lips coming back together in a watery smile. richie suppresses a laugh. “you know, other than banging your mom. ‘fraid she’s always gonna be my biggest score.”

“beep beep, richie!” eddie shrieks, pushing him away. he’s smiling furiously as he shakes his head. “there has to be something wrong with you. like, clinically.” 

richie throws his hands in the air. “this isn’t news to either of us, eds. you’re the one that has my pharmacist on speed dial, apparently.” 

“well, i’m your emergency contact, and i’m also in love with you, so.” eddie rolls his eyes and reaches down to grab his bag from the floor, face turning bashful—as if he’s realizing it again, as if he can’t believe that he’s really saying it out loud; richie can surely relate—just for a second before he starts again. “but seriously, i think your greatest accomplishment is _telling_ me, not _not telling me,_ after all—” he gestures vaguely to richie, tilting his head to the side skeptically— “all that. christ, you’d think i was waterboarding you.”

richie coos. “oh, babe, i mean, if you’re into that…”

“beep beep! beep beep beep beep _beep!”_ he’s halfway to opening his planner but chooses to recoil halfway across the room and chuck it over at richie instead, missing horribly. “i hate you,” he says gravely, face flushing a deep red as he struggles to lean against the desk.

the smile on richie’s face is dangerously large, threatening to split him in two. he takes a moment to grab eddie’s planner from where it’s trapped itself between the wall and the bed, then carefully smooths out the pages that got bent back. he crosses his legs and looks up, dreamy.

“i hate you, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> gay! thanks for reading, pls drop a comment and lmk what u thought if ur so inclined 🥺 or come hang w me on [tumblr](http://losersclub3000.tumblr.com)!


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